Breaking the chains, winning the games, and saving Western Civilization.

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Why women fall for liars

Many deltas and gammas have a hard time understanding why women reliably fall for lying jerks who are not what they seem to be and treat them badly time and time again. This goes a little beyond the conventional Game explanation, in the sense that it is one thing if a woman is attracted to a lying alpha who treats her badly and goes along with the program in the full knowledge of the consequences, it is something else entirely when the woman is legitimately surprised that the lying alpha would behave in exactly the manner anyone who has observed him for a reasonable time would expect him to behave.

Now, Game certainly explains an amount of the phenomenon with the Rationalization Hamster. But it's not always enough, in the not-infrequent cases when there isn't even any rationalizing taking place. The following survey offers a compelling explanation for why some girls simply cannot discern when a man is a liar and when he is not. It also explains why deltas and gammas have such a hard time accepting the inability of those girls to do so.

A new study by the Girl Scouts of America, “Real to Me: Girls and Reality TV,” found that not only are the reality-TV shows popular with young female viewers, but these same viewers have a hard time discerning fact from fiction. Of the 1,100 girls surveyed for the GSA report, 50 percent said the shows are “mainly real and unscripted” when just the opposite is true. If that isn’t bad enough, those questioned also have come to accept the antics regularly portrayed on the programs such as fighting and gossiping as part of normal behavior

The hard truth that those who tend to pedestalize women will find difficult to accept is that many women really are that stupid. If a woman can't tell that reality TV isn't real, how on Earth are she supposed to be able to tell when a man is posing, when a man is lying, and when a man is only pretending to care about her?

And this is precisely why male predators don't hesitate to tell even the most ludicrously absurd stories to women. They will do so because a statistically significant number of women will believe literally anything you tell them. Combine that tendency with the Rationalization Hamster effect on women who are actually capable of actual cognitive activity, and that means that an attractive man can reasonably expect to convince most women of almost anything so long as he does so with a straight face.

Now, my circles tend to run to intelligent, educated women, but even there, I've seen that women often don't react with disbelief to what most men would regard as obvious nonsense. My sense of humor is such that I have been occasionally known to indulge in wildly absurd Cliff Clavenisms that only sound plausible so long as you don't think about it. And one thing I've noticed is that while men very rarely fall for it, many women will more often than not so long as it is at least tangentially connected to the subject at hand.

31 comments:

I've actually sat down and tried to explain this very topic (scripting in reality shows, from Jersey Shore to the Bachelor) to a number of women* and, even after proving that they are, indeed, scriptd and edited to within an inch of their lives to create the desired effect, you can still tell that they just *do not* want to believe it--it's almost like such things are a religious conviction, and no amount of counter-evidence is going to sway a true believer.

So, yeah, I think just writing them as off as stupid, in many cases, is failing to do this phenomenon (as stupid as it looks) justice.

Simple enough, isn't it? What women think of as objective reality is what men call "consensus reality" or "popular prejudice". TV has immense social prestige. What it says is therefore true by definition, and by "by definition", I mean "by definition".

Maybe the difference between a leader and a player is the leader can effectively bullshit men, but the player is only good enough to bullshit women.

I have known a few scumbags that do well enough with hot women but every dude they know either thinks they're total sleaze or wants nothing to do with them because they're such jerks. You tend to watch your back and/or your wallet when they're around.

I have no idea what the women see in them other than Asshole Game. Sadly, that's more than enough to bring in some really hot tail.

Women also desperately want to believe this stuff, from the reality TV to the fantastical stories of the men we are attracted to. Don't forget how much most women love drama. It makes seeing through the stories SO much more difficult.

Don't forget how much most women love drama. It makes seeing through the stories SO much more difficult.

What does that have to do with anything? I mean, I enjoy musicals, but that doesn't make it any harder for me to see what is there, and what is not, regardless of whether someone bursts into song or not.

I think she means that there are more emotions (drama) involved so that further clouds a woman's already emotionally driven judgement. And since many women thrive on that type of stuff, it just reinforces their "insanity".

What does that have to do with anything? I mean, I enjoy musicals, but that doesn't make it any harder for me to see what is there, and what is not, regardless of whether someone bursts into song or not.

Because they are watching in on TV and are being told it is really real. Because this is a guy that they want to believe telling her it is real. It's not on some stage being sold as a play. Fox News is essentially entertainment as well. How many people believe it is real because they want to? Women are capable of taking it to the Nth degree because they want to believe the lie. It somehow adds to the excitement of the whole thing (or to the attraction of the man who is telling the story). If someone told women who were going to see a musical (and many men as well) that is was based on a true story how many do you honestly think would see through that? Throw the word reality in there and how can that possibly be a lie?

There's great merit to this article. I think that several phycologists (with the aid of a team of scientists) have actually found a gene that they believe is the root of why some women fall for untrustworthy men.

On an aside, I really enjoy the work on this site-- I'm a journalist based out of Toronto and have a dating blog myself. How would you feel about collaborating for an article? I would love to write a guest post for your site! If you'd be interested in having me work on a blog post for you, please let me know! pricel@live.ca.

Try doing the opposite - say something completely logical and sane, but use an emotional tone incongruent with what you're actually saying. Women will spot the contradiction right away, because the disconnect is emotional and not logical.

@RVT - It occurs to me that your observation points to what drives women to make a claim of being 'lied to'. I think men are far more likely than women to get their words and emotional intonation crosswise. I'm thinking of the stereotypical pleadings of a beta guy in trouble with a girl (been there, done that, trying to learn not to do it again). The total lack of confidence in his emotional language makes anything he says seem like a desperate attempt to con her.

I was at a party with a girlfriend way back when and her friend asked me what I did for a living. In Southern California, with me having a high and tight plus two USMC tattoos that are very prominent. I told her I was currently focusing on running drugs, with future plans to expand into guns and especially prostitution. Very high profit margin there. Plus, you can reuse the inventory.

I said all of that with a very straight face. She got a very frightened/confused look on her face and backed away slowly from me. In hindsight, I might have been wearing my kill face when I answered her.

If you start to defend yourself logically, your emotional tone says you're being defensive and lack confidence. Every word out of your mouth is factual, logical. But she senses the dichotomy between words and emotional information.

You fail.

If instead you amplify, and/or reframe, your emotional tone of confidence reassures her. Your answer, even if an exaggeration or logically a confirmation of her accusation, makes her feel that all is well with the relationship because you are not in the least bit nervous about her reaction.

"What women think of as objective reality is what men call "consensus reality" or "popular prejudice". TV has immense social prestige. What it says is therefore true by definition, and by "by definition", I mean "by definition"."

This is the basis of preselection and other Game concepts that deal with perceived image.

To express myself a bit more clearly: It's not an issue of intelligence. While men hear a string words and understand them as an abstract, logical concept, women hear something and process the words into an appropriate emotion. They literally think in emotions. Take stg58's story as an example - the girl believed him because both his words and his body language said "I'm scary". So long as the emotions you project are consistent with the words you say, you can get women to believe just about anything. Meanwhile, when a socially awkward man asks a woman out, he's clearly contradicting himself - his words are assertive, but his body language is meek and cowardly. She's knows him for what is(a loser pretending to be something he's not) instantly.

Women are much better than men at detecting liars. Men are much better than women at detecting lies.

@ RVT, not always. Sometimes, women don't care enough to address outright falsehood especially when its a fib to make him look or sounds better. Some women don't even recognize lies due to being so immersed in other things.

Speaking of the media and telelvision, turn that nonsense off. It was always an illusion, there is literally no reason to tune in to anything. (I'll think of something I watch...) it is stunning that so many women lived on each and every moment of a certain "marriage" on E!, just to be shocked, shocked, when it "failed". It was like sex in the city on crack dressed in white complete with the monster mother in law.

No one seems to understands its all ratings, its all trash and its all bread/circus. Most deliciously of all, none of it is real. It is why the rationalization hamster and our eyes make women see thru the glass darkly.

@RTV - I get what you're saying though I still cringe at using the words 'lie' or 'liar' in that context. You were dead on with the idea that women are going to give much more weight to the emotional content of a message, which is something that most men are going to screen out.

That sounds like you'll get better results lying to women if you don't even try to make any sense. Your delivery will be more smooth, sure, confident and unconflicted if you just say random shit instead of Hemming and hawing while you try to think of something airtight.

Ive been doing that with women all my life -- Cliff Klavanisms. It's fun, theyfall for any thing. After 4 years my girlfriend still falls for the dumbest shit, as long as the delivery is smooth and offhand.

They dont't detect liars as such; they just detect people who show certain signs of lying badly. Hell, they just babble themselves, don't they? They happily chatter away at each other. The content is almost random.